KZ Engine & Frame numbers

By Bounce: As you can imagine I am now a bit confused as your list shows the 1979 KZ750B4 starting at KZ750BE033101 & mine is KZ750BE039465 & 1978?

As with most if not all vehicles, the year of mfg isn't necessarily the model year. 1979 models would have been made in the last half of 1978 or the first half of 1979.  

Ah ok, so you dont think Kawasaki have made a mistake then.

What sort of mistake? Is the vin decal still attached to the steering head? If so, I bet it has a November or December 1978  manufacturing date, which would make the bike a 1979 model.

There is no date sticker on the headstock only the Vin No & Kawasaki Japan are saying according to their records it is a July1978 manufactured B4.

I don't see the early police bikes.

As I said in the past  I have attempted something like this but with only the (K)Z650 machines.  I could only find certain info and none of it from Kawasaki. I was able to find info from micro fiche that limited B3 numbers to a point and there have been several different vin numbers posted that fall outside the info I could find the B3 and before the info I could find for the B4. .I became clear that I did not have all the info I was seeking. I would suggest this it what has happened here.  I do tip my hat to the attempt to pull this info together. It is much harder than you may think. 

Anyone can see there is a lot of hard work gone into this & I bet it wasn't easy finding all the information, I suppose there will always be a few irregularities with any manufacturer.

VW always start the next model year following summer shutdown in July, I seem to remember seeing on the forum that Kawasaki's switch over was even earlier in the year (poss June/July)

That would certainly explain things.

SWest wrote:

I don't see the early police bikes.

i have not been able to find any reliable info on either series of copcycles.

gd4now wrote:

As I said in the past  I have attempted something like this but with only the (K)Z650 machines.  I could only find certain info and none of it from Kawasaki. I was able to find info from micro fiche that limited B3 numbers to a point and there have been several different vin numbers posted that fall outside the info I could find the B3 and before the info I could find for the B4. .I became clear that I did not have all the info I was seeking. I would suggest this it what has happened here.  I do tip my hat to the attempt to pull this info together. It is much harder than you may think. 

For some reason the 650 info is harder to come by. Even the back cover of the shop manuals for them have limited info.
In compiling the list posed here, I stuck to Kawasaki publications, mostly factory service manuals and the model identification booklets.

Wookie58 wrote:

VW always start the next model year following summer shutdown in July, I seem to remember seeing on the forum that Kawasaki's switch over was even earlier in the year (poss June/July)


I remember it was someone that worked in the Nebraska plant. He said that they got the first two weeks of July off and then came back and started the next year's production run.

I could be wrong, sometimes I get CRS.